Hilda Gerald, who died in Pinehurst, N.C., at age 94 in 1990, had a reputation – one that is now carved in stone.
Some of Hilda’s friends and family felt she had not been given a proper headstone when she passed on, so ten years after her death, they purchased one, had it installed and gathered at her gravesite in West End, N.C., to honor her.
Carved on her tombstone are these words: “Hilda S. Gerald, Encourager of Missionaries.” Along with the names of Hilda and her late husband, Jack Gerald, a horse trainer who died in 1976, the stone features a special design on its right side – six cascading mailing envelopes.
“Hilda came to our church, Sandhills Assembly (in Southern Pines, N.C.) about 1978 when she was 82,” says Miriam Jones of Pinehurst (Miriam was born in 1914.) “Hilda began a ministry of encouraging our missionaries all over the world.”
Jones says Hilda, who was born in Sweden in 1896, asked her daughter, Inge Marra of Brooklyn, N.Y., to design a special birthday card – one Hilda could send to each member of Assembly of God missionary families.
Kay Beard, former secretary at Sandhills Assembly, estimates that white-haired Hilda sent 200 cards each month.
“She was quaint and had such joy,” Beard says. “Many missionaries communicated their sadness at her passing.”
“The stamps for these cards and letters were too much for her budget,” Jones says, “so she sold her crafts and advertised her need wherever appropriate. She always wanted beautiful stamps.”
Jones says a young man who moved away from the Sandhills once returned to visit Hilda and introduced her to a fellow traveling with him.
“As usual, Hilda mentioned her ministry of writing to missionaries,” Jones says. “She told them her next purchase of stamps would cost $24.25. As the men left, they each gave her $10. Hilda received the gifts with thanks and held out her hand, saying with her Swedish accent, ‘And four dollars and 25 cents, please.’”
Jones laughs, adding, “She got it!”
Jones says when Hilda “fasted,” she did not stop eating because of a heart condition, but she would “fast” her knitting, crocheting and craft-making – activities she automatically busied herself with when there was a quiet moment.
Hilda’s father was a Swede who married an Englishwoman.
“He was a ‘tailor to gentlemen,’” says Jones, recalling Hilda’s stories about her younger years. “Hilda said she wanted a doll when she was about four years old. She made one, and when her father saw it, he told her mother, ‘That one will get along all right. No need to worry about her.’”
Jones recalls Hilda, who worked many yeas as a chef, saying she became a Christian at a Salvation Army meeting before she married “Dave” and came to America at age 17.
Hilda and her sister, Vera Jacobson, who predeceased Hilda, would walk two miles to Garner’s Lake to swim, says Evelyn Garrison of Pinehurst.
“They must have been in their eighties,” Garrison says. “Hilda kept trim and had an appealing glow. She renewed her license at 85 and drove her old blue Malibu.”
Garrison says Hilda used crayons and watercolors to decorate the cards she sent to missionaries, and when she lacked money for stamps, she’d say, “Oh, they’ll come. I’ll get it. God will provide.”
“She was not one who cared for material things,” Garrison says. “She often quoted Jeremiah 33:3: ‘Call unto me, and I will answer thee and show thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.’
“We who knew her saw her simple lifestyle and saw the abundant life that came from her faith in God. She was a fountain of inspiration for all of us.”
Now “Hilda Gerald, Encourager of Missionaries” is engraved on her tombstone, and on the right side of that stone are six carved images of envelopes, designed so they overlap each other and cascade downward, as if falling from a mailbag.
“No matter what circumstances life may present, we all have unique experiences, abilities, and God-given talents,” says writer Steve Brunkhorst. “We can discover ways to reach others who desperately need messages of encouragement and strength.”
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